


I set all my regrets on fire

by waferkya



Series: moonshine [2]
Category: Basketball RPF
Genre: Fluff and Angst, M/M, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-26
Updated: 2012-11-26
Packaged: 2017-11-19 15:27:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/574786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waferkya/pseuds/waferkya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Juan Carlos' relationship with Ricky is not without consequences. Vanessa is a merciless friend. Pau missed his mate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I set all my regrets on fire

 

The main inconvenience of being the Alpha, the one and only leader of a pack that sometimes feels as large as life itself, is that no matter how tired or hungry or dying to go home Juan Carlos is, there are certain things he can’t delegate. Not ever.

It’s been a quiet day, no crisis to be handled and just the right amount of paperwork to keep him from getting bored out of his mind; Juan Carlos scratches the tip of his nose and thinks, _maybe I can get some sushi for dinner. Ricky loved it last time_.

And then there’s a light rap on his door, and after a moment, Pichu pokes his head in without waiting for Juan Carlos’ permission. That’s usually not a good sign.

“Ehr,” Pichu says, his face the very image of contrition. “Juanqui, I’m sorry, we might be having a bit of a problem.”

Juan Carlos gets out of his chair with a sigh, and straightens his tie.

*

He does bring home sushi, eventually. It’s not even _that_ late, mind you, but he went out this morning wearing a suit and now he’s in jeans and a hoodie, his dress shoes still on because he always forgets to bring an extra pair of sneakers to the office. Ricky didn’t have training today, so he won’t even be stoned on fatigue: he’ll be able to actually notice things, and he’ll know something happened.

Juan Carlos’ hands tighten around the wheel and he drives a little faster; for the first time in weeks, he finds himself wishing his home to be empty when he gets back.

Of course, his home turns out to be everything _but_ that.

Juan Carlos pulls into the driveway and Vanessa’s car is parked in its usual spot. That’s when he remembers that, yep, it’s a Wednesday, so the girls are coming over. He closes his eyes and tips his head back, and if he bangs it a couple of times against the headrest, well, it’s entirely his business.

He looks at the four huge boxes of Barcelona’s best sushi, neatly stacked on the passenger’s seat, and once again he’s insanely grateful for Pichu’s overzealousness. He rubs his face with both hands and slowly breathes out.

“It’s okay,” he tells himself. Maybe Ricky decided to go back to his own place for today.

Juan Carlos steps out of the car; he can’t hear any voices coming from the house, because he had it flawlessly sound-proofed, and there’s not even a cracked window since it’s December and it’s freezing out here.

He picks up the sushi and walks to the main door; for a second he considers ringing the bell, but then he decides against it. He only has to balance four pounds of fish onto one hand to get his keys out of his coat’s pocket after all, it’s no biggie.

Juan Carlos pushes the door open with his shoulder, then he quickly steps out of his dress shoes, kicking them in the corner where all the shoes belong; there’s a pair of heels neatly laid against the wall, so Vanessa didn’t take the girls out for a walk. As for Ricky, there’s too many other pairs of shoes thrown messily together, so there’s no way to tell if he’s still here or not.

His scent is all over the house, but the kid has been around so much that not even that is conclusive evidence in its own.

Juan Carlos hears the television from the living room, and Lucía’s chatter; he smiles to himself, and clears his throat. His smile grows a little when his daughter stops talking altogether, and then Juan Carlos hears her footsteps, muffled by whatever thick winter socks she’s wearing. Less than a second later, the girl appears in front of him and lets out a delighted squeal.

“Daddy!” she hollers, happy as the sun, and she throws herself towards him to hug his knees. Juan Carlos giggles and shoves the sushi boxes on the first horizontal surface he finds — a bookshelf half-brimming with old magazines and newspapers, nothing of importance, — to better grab her by the waist and lift her up.

He kisses the top of her head and says, “Hello to you, too.”

Lucía pulls at the spiky tips of his hair and kicks his chest a little.

“You’re late, daddy,” she says; Juan Carlos shifts so that she’s safe sitting in the curve of his elbow, and then he reaches out to take the sushi.

“I know, baby, I’m sorry,” he tells her, but Lucía is already distracted by the colourful lid of the top box. There’s a cartoon of a California Roll with bright button eyes and a friendly smile, and she puts her little hands on it.

“Wha’ is it?”

“Dinner,” Juan Carlos says, even though he’s not exactly sure a three-year-old should be allowed to eat raw fish. Vanessa will probably kill him. Oh, well.

Lucía tries to take a peek inside the boxes all the way into the living room, and Juan Carlos keeps shifting them just out of her reach at the very last second, because he’s so in love with the way she pouts and glares at him.

“Welcome back, Juanki,” Ricky greets them, turning a little with a grin splitting his face from ear to ear. Juan Carlos tries to cringe, he really does, but there’s something weirdly great and right about Ricky sitting on his couch, Elsa in his lap and with those annoying Teletubbies things on the television.

Juan Carlos’ head snaps right back the moment he processes that; his secondborn is sitting on Ricky’s knees, and the worst thing about it is, she’s not even facing the TV. She’s been so in love with those ugly muppets, lately, that she didn’t even eat whenever they were on, she was so focused; and now the creepy vacuum thing is going around the screen with the little monsters dancing all around it, and she doesn’t even care, because she’s too busy playing with Ricky’s fingers and giggling every time he makes a face.

Juan Carlos probably just had a miniature heart-attack.

“He’s good with kids,” Vanessa says, and surprisingly enough, she didn’t make that sound like an insult. She takes the sushi boxes from Juan Carlos’ hand, and hums in appreciation.

“I just — are you okay?” Juan Carlos asks her, because Vanessa is one damn protective mother and sometimes she still hisses at _him_ when he picks up one of the girls, so he can’t really believe she left Elsa with Ricky. Who’s seventeen.

“I’m great,” she replies, but she grins so that he knows that she knows what he’s thinking. She leans in to kiss his cheek and adds, “Thanks for the sushi.”

“Did you say sushi?” Ricky calls out, and the moment he takes his eyes off of Elsa, his hands slip around her waist to keep her from tumbling off his legs. Juan Carlos is completely baffled. And also a little scared. Lucía tugs at his beard.

“What’s a sushi?”

“Sushi is food, Japanese people came up with it,” Vanessa explains, and as she’s taken the boxes to the kitchen island, she starts to unwrap things. Juan Carlos follows her, because it seems like the most logical thing to do, and then he lets Lucía sit on the countertop.

“I like Japanese people,” the girl says, thoughtfully, after a moment. “Like, Hello Kitty and Dragon Ball.”

“Dago—bo!” Elsa yells from the couch, delighted. Ricky laughs.

“Dragon Ball is awesome,” he says, because _he_ would think that. Lucía lits up and starts babbling about dragons granting wishes and martial arts and talking pigs; she doesn’t really make sense half the time, and her wobbly attempts at longer sentences end up crashing into each other, but Ricky seems to tune into the conversation perfectly and he’s so engrossed he has to lift off the couch, Elsa safely in his arms, and come sitting at the kitchen’s island, closer to Lucía and right next to Juan Carlos.

“Goku’s mah favourite,” Lucía says, at some point. Then she blushes a little. “’icky looks like Goku.”

Ricky honest-to-God coos at that, and then he’s saying something about her being so much more beautiful and badass than both Chi-Chi and Bulma; Lucía turns even more pink around her ears and Vanessa laughs discreetely. Juan Carlos is thoroughly terrified, now.

His daughter has a crush on Ricky.

“Help me,” he mouths at Vanessa, without uttering a sound, over Lucía’s shoulder. The sadistic woman, however, only keeps laughing and arranging raw fish into plates.

Something, which turns out to be Ricky’s knee, taps against Juan Carlos’ thigh.

“Juanki, whispering’s impolite,” he says, those terrible lips curled up in a coy smirk. His eyes are sparkling and Elsa is standing up on his lap, sticking her fingers everywhere into his face.

Juan Carlos’ throat turns dry and, for some reason, his stupid heart trips all over itself.

*

He puts the girls to sleep without any fuss, because apparently, Ricky is an exhausting play-date, and they were both out as lights the moment their heads touched the pillow.

Juan Carlos goes back to the living room downstairs, where he can smell the bottle of wine Vanessa has opened. She’s sitting at the kitchen’s island, watching as Ricky finishes clearing the table and piling dishes in the sink. She has poured three stemmed glasses of a rich, golden white Port, and Juan Carlos grins a little.

“He’s seventeen,” he tells her, sitting on the stool to her left and taking a glass. Vanessa doesn’t even bother taking her eyes off the wine.

“He’s old enough,” she says; on the other side of the island, Ricky blushes, but his smile is a little pleased.

Juan Carlos thinks, _he’s old enough for me to sleep with him_ , and he knows that that’s exactly what Vanessa wanted him to think, so he shuts up.

Vanessa does look at him, now, and her eyes go softer.

“How was work?” she asks, like a peace offering. Juan Carlos takes a sip of the wine. It’s a little sweeter than what he likes.

“Boring morning,” he tells her, shrugging a little. He gets distracted when Ricky sits next to him; the kid is warm, his scent just slightly tinged with Lucía’s and Elsa’s, and Juan Carlos closes his eyes for a moment. “The afternoon got interesting.”

Vanessa nods. “Heard about it. La Penya again? What was it this time, they got scared of their own shadow?”

Juan Carlos pouts a little as he feels Ricky get tense.

“They had some problems with trespassers,” he offers, keeping his voice as neutral as he can, his heartbeat in check. “I dealt with it.”

“Is everyone okay?” Ricky asks, a bit anxiously; Juan Carlos looks at him and touches his cheek.

“Yes,” he says, and it’s not even a lie, because what Ricky meant was, _is everyone I know and everyone I ever met or just walked past when I was in Badalona okay?_ And they are. No one from their pack was hurt.

Ricky’s shoulders immediately sag down, and he gives Juan Carlos one of his smallest smiles, which means he’s relieved, and grateful, and just generally happier than he was a second ago. Juan Carlos chokes back the urge to lean in and kiss him, and that effort probably shows up on his face, because Ricky’s soft expression grows into a smirk.

“I’m going to sleep,” the kid says, jumping off the stool and stretching a little — his shirt rides up his flat stomach, exposing skin and the sharp line of his hips. Juan Carlos hears Vanessa chuckle lightly behind him, and he knows for sure she likes Ricky, which is a little scary, seeing how she usually doesn’t get to like anyone this fast. “Don’t stay up too late, okay?”

“Funny how it’s the teenager that’s saying something like that,” Vanessa teases, but she’s smiling. Juan Carlos looks at her and thinks that she’s so beautiful it’s almost ridiculous. Then he looks at Ricky, and he thinks the same thing all over again.

“G’night,” Ricky says; Juan Carlos waves, and then he downs what was left of his wine in one gulp. Vanessa laughs.

“Easy, tiger.”

“Yeah, right,” he mumbles; he grabs the bottle for a refill, but then he considers the fact that he’s perched on top of a stool, and that doesn’t seem like a very smart idea.

Once more, Vanessa is tuned in on his thoughts.

“Couch,” she says, taking the bottle from him and slipping off the stool. “You have to drink, because we need to talk.”

Juan Carlos groans, but eventually he does drag himself all the way to the couch. Vanessa folds her legs under herself exactly the same way that Ricky does, then she reaches out under an armchair and grabs the thick blanket Juan Carlos keeps there for his Lost marathons.

She wraps them both under the huge duvet and then passes Juan Carlos his glass, magically refilled.

“Bottoms up,” she says.

He does his best not to look at all the pictures of himself and Pau hanging everywhere on the walls as he drains the wine.

*

One bottle is not even nearly enough to get Juan Carlos warm and stupid enough to really start talking; Vanessa knows that, and she probably raided a wine shop on her way here, at least judging from the amount of alcohol she keeps flowing into Juan Carlos’ glass.

“Okay, okay,” he says, when he’s somewhere between mild intoxication and complete shitfacedness. “I’m talking, see? I am. I have work tomorrow, Vane, I’ll talk.”

She’s not so easily persuaded, and she forces him to drink another glass.

“Okay,” she agrees, then. And then, she aims her merciless headshot: “Have you talked to Pau?”

Juan Carlos stares at the television, which they turned off hours ago, and he briefly wishes he was drunker.

If he focuses hard enough, he can hear Lucía and Elsa and Ricky breathing upstairs, even through all the closed door and the sound-proof walls; they’are all asleep, he knows that for sure because he knows their breathing patterns like the back of his own hand. It also helps that Ricky’s overall completely shit at pretending he’s sleeping.

Juan Carlos bites his lips.

“I have.”

Vanessa nods.

“What did he say?”

“He wants to see me,” Juan Carlos says. “I’m going there on Friday.”

“Does Ricky know?”

“Yeah. He even offered to pack for me.”

Vanessa slaps the back of his neck and glares. “You know what I mean.”

“I — I really don’t,” Juan Carlos says.

He’s a terrible liar, and Vanessa is scary smart, and she knows him so well she doesn’t really need him to tell her these things, she could’ve guessed them all wihtout breaking a sweat. Hell, she probably has. She probably wrote a script for this conversation days ago, and then she’ll go home tonight, and check how much of it she got right. Spoiler alert: that would be everything. Juan Carlos hopes she made bets with Zoe; whenever Vane wins a bet she gets softer for a while.

The only reason she’s still here is because she likes to torture him, make him talk about _feelings_ and _things_.

Juan Carlos knows every resistance is useless; she’ll peel the skin off of him until she’s sure he can’t hide anything anywhere, and then they’ll pick up the pieces together. Vanessa is terrible, she won’t spare him any pain and she won’t allow any shortcut; she doesn’t tolerate cowardice and lazyness, she’s the Dusko Ivanovic of friendships, and she’s also the best thing that’s ever happened to Juan Carlos, after Pau and his daughters.

She wants to know if he ever took the trouble to talk to Ricky about Pau, what Pau means to him, and maybe even what Ricky himself means to Juan Carlos. And Juan Carlos didn’t, because he doesn’t know what he’d say.

It’s not that he doesn’t know about these things, thank you very much, he’s not that emotionally stumped; Pau is his mate, he’s his life in the cheesiest sense possible: Juan Carlos is happy just knowing that Pau exists somewhere on the planet, and is his. He’s been feeling like that for ten years, there’s no way he could’ve missed the main message, that Pau is the most important person.

It’s a little embarrassing to admit out loud, but it’s true nonetheless.

What Juan Carlos doesn’t know, because he doesn’t really want to think about it, is what Ricky’s place is in all this, and why in the Moon’s name did he let in such a kid.

Sure, Ricky grew up faster than anyone else Juan Carlos knows, but he didn’t get older one bit; he’s the very embodiment of everything childish, cocky, and unnerving. He can play the part of the good soldier just as well as the next person; he takes his responsibilities on court, he smiles and says all the right things during press conferences, but his instinct, his true nature, is always crackling beneath his skin, and it screams for him to give in to an impish, dimpled smile that’s too big for his face, tell a bad joke and ramble on and on about unicorns and anime.

He’s _seventeen_ , for crying out loud. He has every right to be a cocky douchebag who can’t resist a challenge; he has every right to nurse huge, embarrassing crushes on his older half-hero of an Alpha, and fuck, he even has every right to act up on his feelings, but Juan Carlos is an entirely different matter. He had no right whatsoever to give in to Ricky; he had no right to take him in, cook him dinner, let him spend that first night in his bed and then all the ones that came after that.

Juan Carlos should have known better, especially because he does know better: he knows Pau. He has Pau. He didn’t need Ricky, and he doesn’t, but still, he couldn’t give him up; it’s been three weeks already, and if he was a little honest with himself, he’d be grateful that Vanessa won’t let him get away with this anymore.

He sighs, eventually. “He knows.”

“But have you talked to him?” Vanessa insists. Juan Carlos rolls his eyes.

“You know I haven’t.”

She reaches out under the blanket to pat his knee.

“Congratulations,” she says, dripping sarcasm. “I’m sure this is gonna end wonderfully.”

Juan Carlos pinches the root of his nose between two fingers. He desperately wants to ask, _what do you want me to do?_ But he can’t, not really, because that would only make Vanessa mad at him. He knows what he should do — get a therapist, lock himself away from all human contact, be the lonely leader this giant fucking pack needs, and nothing more. Life is way too complicated for him.

“I miss basketball, you know,” he mumbles, under his breath. Vanessa raises an eyebrow.

“You don’t play with Ricky?”

Juan Carlos shrugs. “It’s not the same. I miss—” he breathes in, looking for the right word to explain himself. When he can’t think of anything, he shrugs again. “I miss everything.”

“That doesn’t explain why you’d go around picking up strays from the street,” Vanessa comments, rather icily. Juan Carlos winces.

“That was gratuitous,” he says. “And mean. I didn’t—”

Vanessa makes a dismissive gesture with her hand, which Juan Carlos decides to take as an apology. “Yeah, no, you’re right, he told me about it. He came at you at the supermarket.”

“He was in heat.”

“He’s seventeen.”

Juan Carlos bites back, “He’s old enough,” just as spitefully as Vanessa had earlier.

That seems to hit her pretty bad; she sets down her glass and puts her head on Juan Carlos’ shoulder. Her hair smells of apples.

“I’m sorry, baby,” she says, and he circles her narrow shoulders with an arm, pulling her closer. “I’m worried, that’s all. Do you— do you think Pau’s just gonna be okay with it?”

“Yes.” Juan Carlos doesn’t even have to think about it.

“Why?”

“Because he’s the one who got away,” he tells her, flatly.

Vanessa picks up her head to look at him for a long moment, and there’s a sort of soft pity on her face that Juan Carlos doesn’t really get. She sighs.

“It’s not easy like that,” she says, scooting closer, her knees digging into his side under the blanket. “I get why you think that — you know that he loves you, and he wants to be enough for you but more than that, he wants you to be happy. You think he’ll say, this is not what I want, but if it makes you happy, then I’m okay with it… but Juanca, baby, it’s not easy like that.”

“It was for me.”

“Oh, God,” she groans, and she rubs the heel of one hand to her forehead. “How can you be such a great leader when you’re so shitty at handling your personal life, I’ll never understand.”

“It’s not so bad,” Juan Carlos muses. “I have you, and Pau, and the girls, and everyone. It works fine.”

“Yes, because I’m the greatest person to ever exist, and Pau and Marc and everyone else — we all love you so much it makes us ridiculously stupid. But it won’t be enough forever, Juanca, that’s what I’m saying,” Vanessa tickles him lightly in the ribs. “And you can’t count the girls, that’s cheating.”

“Vane, Pau and me… it doesn’t work like that. Our — our thing, it’s strong enough. It is.”

“You can’t even _say_ it.”

“Because it’s our thing, I don’t — it’s not something we share, it’s _ours_.”

She stays quiet for a while.

“And you think he’ll be okay sharing you.”

Juan Carlos bites his bottom lip.

“He will,” he says. He honestly thinks that. “He is already. I’m not — we don’t own each other; we’re just, we’re just there for each other. And I share him with the entire nation of the United States, and those girls sometimes he has, and he shares me with you, and Marc, and Pichu and Alex and everyone, and now Ricky.”

“You slept with me twice, and the sky will split open and swallow the planet, the day you finally make a move on Baso,” Vanessa says, and from her tone, Juan Carlos knows she’s rolling her eyes. “Baby, Ricky’s been here for three weeks. I’m just saying, don’t be delusional.”

Juan Carlos considers that, and in the end, he decides he’s not fooling anyone. Pau will understand.

Vanessa sighs a little again, and then she says, “I love you. I don’t want to peel you off the floor, okay?”

“I’ll be careful.”

“Yeah. Except you never are.”

*

In November, when Ricky’s heat finally kicked in, Juan Carlos took care of him.

One day, Ricky dragged him into the shower, rubbed up a little against him, and Juan Carlos didn’t miss a beat; he pushed his thumb against Ricky’s raw, slightly swollen entrance, and stared as the boy tensed and sucked in a shallow breath.

“Can you come from just this?” Juan Carlos asked, genuinely curious; Ricky didn’t know what to answer, but as it turned out, he should’ve said yes.

Now he’s confident Juan Carlos could make him do anything — come, or sit still for five straight minutes or even shoot a three-pointer and nail it, — just by looking at him the right way, for a moment too long.

*

It’s not that easy, Vanessa said, and she was so spectacularly wrong it’s probably a first. It’s easy as fuck for Juan Carlos to kiss Ricky on the porch, get into his car and drive to the airport; it’s easy to sleep through half his flight, it’s easy to wait for the Alpha of Los Angeles to come and greet him, it’s easy to thank him for his hospitality and maybe the only slightly tougher thing is to leave the five boxes of jamon and chorizo behind as a present.

It’s easier still to drop off the limousine they reserved for him right in front of Pau’s home at Marina del Rey; Juan Carlos has keys to the place, so it’s a matter of minutes before he’s slipping into the living room, throwing his bag off his shoulder and breathing in the unadulterated scent of Pau — his life, his things, his books and his moods, the steak he forgot on the barbecue three nights ago, before leaving for the game in Oklahoma.

Juan Carlos smiles a little to himself; Pau won’t be home for another couple of hours, so he walks around the place for a while, picking up a cup of stale tea from the living room and emptying it into the kitchen’s sink. He rubs a thumb across the rough skin of the basketball from last year’s World Cup, which is sitting between Proust and Sepulveda. He knows it’s not the ball from the final, Berni took that one; this is one of the spares, Pau stole it from an utility room when it was probably still brand new and untouched.

Eventually, Juan Carlos ends up in Pau’s bedroom. With the schedule he has, Pau doesn’t really get to sleep here that much, except on the four days of break they get on full moons every three months; any other league in the world allows for three days every other month, some even go as far as monthly moonbreaks with players taking turns, but the NBA is insane like that, and all the athletes keep swearing that it only takes a little adaptability and then everything’s peachy.

Then again, America is the greatest market for ataraxics in the whole fucking world.

Anyway, the point is the room doesn’t reek of Pau as much as Juan Carlos would’ve liked. The bed is sharply done, with prison corners, the pillows crisp and neatly stacked against the headrest; there’s not a spare sock in sight, or anything out of place; the curtains are closed and Juan Carlos pulls them open, staring at the ocean for a while.

He can’t help but to admit that the place is amazing.

The sun has just about started to set, hanging like a ripe orange above the horizon, painting both the sky and the water in large brushstrokes of gold and pink and purple, when Pau comes home.

Juan Carlos ended up on his bed, reading a book of poetry, of all things, by Luis García Montero; he hears the garage’s door crawl open and he finds it’s easy to just keep his eyes on the page and wait.

It’s easy to count Pau’s footsteps, his heartbeats, and it’s easy to smile when Juan Carlos finds they fall into perfect synchrony with his own. It’s awfully easy; everything about him and Pau is, when they’re close. Vanessa doesn’t get it. (Juan Carlos doesn’t, either; not really.)

Pau stops on the bedroom door and tilts his head to the side a little.

“I could smell you from the airport,” he says, in lieu of a greeting. “Good flight?”

“I slept a lot,” Juan Carlos replies, shrugging a little. Then he looks up, and he breaks the very second he actually sees Pau; he doesn’t get to say anything else, because Pau runs to him and kisses him before he can even properly put together a smile.

Juan Carlos sighs and arches up into him, throwing the book on the other half of the bed and cupping Pau’s face to pull him closer.

“I love you,” Pau sighs, his eyes closed and one hand already on Juan Carlos’ thigh, pushing it open wide a little. Juan Carlos smirks.

“I know,” he says, because between the two of them, he’s totally Han. Pau bites him right under his pulsepoint for that, and Juan Carlos has to bite back a whimper.

“Smartass,” Pau tells him, and before it turns into a fourth graders’ battle of insults, Juan Carlos tugs at his jeans a little.

“Please?” he asks, under his breath; he loves the way Pau’s eyes go wide for a second, his pupils blown, his pulse completely out of control.

“Your wish,” Pau says, leaning in to kiss him again. It’s soft, and wet, and it tastes, like it always does, like home.

A tilt of his head and Juan Carlos can kiss deeper. Pau’s hands close around his thighs, thumbs slipping around the curve of his muscles. Both their heartbeats raise and soar; Juan Carlos rubs up against him and Pau makes a half-hearted attempt at pinning him down against the mattress.

Pau breaks off, absently kissing his way down Juan Carlos’ neck as he tugs down his hoodie’s zipper, shoving it away. He helps Juan Carlos slip out of that and the t-shirt he’s wearing — Pau smirks for a second at the stylized Michelangelo, the Ninja Turtle, smiling up at him, — and he throws away the bundle of cloth without thinking, because he wants, he _needs_ to touch and trace with his mouth and remind himself of all the lines of Juan Carlos’ body.

“You, too,” Juan Carlos says, pulling Pau’s shirt out of his pants and unbotting it from the bottom; his fingers are unsteady, and he fumbles a little, so Pau just peels it off his own head. Juan Carlos laughs, then his hands find the familiar curve of Pau’s shoulders and his eyes flash red for a moment.

“I’m right here,” Pau promises. Juan Carlos runs his hands down his back, both of them, to feel him; Pau gives an happy sigh and drops his mouth to Juan Carlos’ shoulder, biting him a little. He moves down from there, breathing in his scent and tasting Juan Carlos’ skin like he has a thousand times before; it’s still the best thing.

It still fires up everything inside him, like a lightning strike running through both his heart and his mind; Pau finds himself aching for it, aching for all that is his Juanqui, and just pressing his lips against him isn’t even enough. He never knows what to do with this ridiculous urge, this feeling that gnaws at him screaming that this is his place, this is the best he’ll ever be — right there, with Juan Carlos pressed close, hot and pliant under his touch.

“God, I love you,” he breathes, a little desperate. Juan Carlos tangles a hand in his hair, brushing gently through it; when Pau looks up, he smiles, biting his bottom lip. He doesn’t really have to say anything.

Pau finds a tiny red bruise on his hip, glaring against paler skin; it makes him angry, for a second, and he sucks and bites his own mark on top of it. His foreteeth are sharper, they are actual fangs for a second, and he's gripping Juan Carlos’ waist hard enough to bruise — hard enough that his nails, his _claws_ leave bright red half-moon marks, —  but Juan Carlos gives a happy sigh and his hips buckle a little.

Pau quickly, almost feverishly throws the rest of their clothes out of the picture; had he waited for Juan Carlos, it would’ve taken them a couple of centuries more, at least. He ends up pressing a dry kiss to Juan Carlos’ inner thigh, then he shifts a little, and brushes his lips to the base of Juan Carlos’ cock.

Pau really has to close his eyes, right then, and let the scent of Juan Carlos’ arousal overwhelm him; it’s slightly different than his usual scent, he reckons. It’s stronger, almost dizzying, and less tinged with everything else he touches or does during the day. It’s just Juan Carlos, there, and Pau slowly, slowly, slowly laps at him.

When he looks up again, Juan Carlos crossed his arms over his face, in a flimsy attempt to hide the epic flush that has him all brightly pink.

“You’re such a tease,” Pau says, grinning widely; Juan Carlos mumbles something unintelligible and Pau has to climb back up the firm length of his entire body, not that he’s complaining, to nose his arms away.

Juan Carlos pouts.

“I said, I like kissing,” he explains, embarrassed to the point he might just melt away at any second. Pau loves him so much it’s not even funny, and leans down to kiss him until they’re both out of breath. The most positive outcome is that, then, Juan Carlos’ lips turn out ot be soft, and swollen, and flushed. Pau shivers — Juan Carlos’ hand wandering on his back, counting his vertebrae, might have something to do with it, — and then he thinks, _God, I can’t take this anymore_ , and honestly, he has no idea how he even managed to live up to this point.

He reaches down and closes his hand around Juan Carlos’ cock and his own.

Juan Carlos’ breath hitches with a delicious, soft little hiccup; Pau smiles, brushes his thumb to the wetness on both their tips. Juan Carlos pushes his hips up and throws his head as far back as he can; his throat is an impressive expanse of tense whiteness, and Pau can only nibble and kiss and lick at it.

_Mine_ , he thinks, possessiveness growing hot and heavy in his chest; he strokes them both excruciatingly slow, just because he can — because for once, they have all the time in the world, and they don’t even have to keep it down.

Juan Carlos, however, begs to disagree; apparently, as much as he loves being a terrible tease, he’s not in the mood for that right now. He nips at Pau’s lips and frowns, disappointed. Pau kisses the corner of his mouth and then he shifts his hands from their cocks — Juan Carlos keeps rolling his hips ever so slightly, — to the small of Juan Carlos’ back, tentatively tracing the curve of his ass. It’s like he’s asking for permission, or maybe he’s just trying to remind him of things; it’s been a while, after all, but Juan Carlos _hmmmph_ ’s the way he always does, half in discomfort and half in pleasure, and Pau can’t bite back a grin.

“Can you relax for me?” he asks, and Juan Carlos just kisses him like he was starving. He’s dry and tight, so Pau reaches over the edge of the mattress, fishing for the half-used bottle of lube he keeps between the bed and the nightstand.

Juan Carlos gives himself up just as easily as ever, and for the umpteenth Pau himself is a little taken aback at the way everything comes natural, always, no matter how long they’ve gone without seeing each other; he just fits perfectly against the curves and angles of Juan Carlos’ body. He can make him sigh or shiver or arch up into his touch just as easily as someone would drive a car; it reminds him a little of playing the piano, but even back then, he didn’t know the keyboard half as well as he knows Juan Carlos and all the things — the sounds, the little movements, the thoughts, — he makes.

Every time, it’s like this is still what Pau does every single day of his life, and then he reaches back and presses in half a finger and.

And.

Juan Carlos is _impossibly_ tight around him, so much that even just one finger has him scrunch his face in what was definitely a pained expression. He catches himself and hides it quickly, but Pau didn’t miss it and anyway, there’s no mistaking the way Juan Carlos’ hips are slipping away from his touch, not into it.

_God_.

Pau blinks, a little stunned. Juan Carlos bites his lower lip and he’s clearly forcing himself not to look away.

“Just — Pau, it’s okay,” he says, flushing red. Pau pulls out, he starts drawing circles with his thumbs into Juan Carlos’ sensitive thighs just to see him blush a little harder.

“You’ve never even—,” he says, raising his eyebrows, and he’s having serious trouble holding down his worst instincts, which are currently dying with the need to mark Juan Carlos, just take him, claim him, as he’s so kindly offering himself, nevermind pack hierarchy or the rest of the world, they’re beyond that.

Juan Carlos shrugs a little, and now he pushes his hips up into Pau’ touch.

“I didn’t really—” he blushes and shakes his head. Pau doesn’t make it any easier for him, nossir, but with a thumb, he teases the wet tip of his desperately hard cock. “I wanted— I _want_ you, not—” Juan Carlos takes a deep breath, and this is the worst conversation he’s ever had; his eyes are screaming I hate you at Pau like it’s a competition. “It’s not the same thing,” he settles for, in the end.

Pau gives a completely dignified whimper, and when he leans in for a kiss, Juan Carlos has the nerve to pout and deny himself for then whole seconds. He gives up, then, of course, and Pau just takes his time to prepare him as cruelly as he can, slow like a goddamn continent drifting away.

He drops kisses like raindrops and small, not-entirely-playful bites everywhere he can, and it’s only when Juan Carlos is all tense and arching up from the bed and whimpering  that Pau does consider lifting his hips up a little, and pressing just the wet tip of his cock against him.

“Juanqui,” he says, because he needs to look at him.

Juan Carlos’ breath is short and shallow, and he’s rocking his hips a little and that’s driving Pau half mad already; his eyes are dark, a little unfocused, his lips swollen and soft and Pau thrusts a little. Juan Carlos bucks up, taking him in deeper, biting his lip and just not breathing anymore; Pau slips all the way in and stops, his own heartbeat thrumming in his ears, Juan Carlos’ legs curled around his waist.

“Pau, just—” Juan Carlos sighs, and Pau _just_ , Pau just can’t. He shifts, and when he finds the right angle, the one that makes goosebumps crawl everywhere up Juan Carlos’ arms and sends his heartbeat fluttering, he draws back, and then he slams in, and Juan Carlos gasps a breathless cry, he gets desperately tight and hot and incredible against the head of Pau’s cock.

Pau’s mind burns away with the first thrust; he can’t think, he can’t breathe, he moves on instinct and feels Juan Carlos pushing back, wanting more — more of this, of him; Juan Carlos pulls him in with his legs, ankles crossed at the small of Pau’s back; he pulls him in grabbing his shoulder and he pulls him in, really, just being there. Pau is drawn to him, consumed by the white-hot noise filling up his chest; this is his place and he leans forward as much as he can to bite Juan Carlos’ neck.

“No one else,” Juan Carlos whispers, as he’s panting and writhing a little under him; _no one else_ , and Pau is absolutely done for, that’s all it takes.

That’s all it’s ever going to take.

 

 

 

nos duele envejecer, pero resulta  
más difícil aún  
comprender que se ama solamente  
aquello que envejece.  
(growing old is hurtful, but it is / even more difficult / to realize that you can only love / what grows old)  
(Luis García Montero)

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Juan Carlos actually has a friend named Pichu, I was as baffled as everyone else when I learned that. As for the rest of this, my only comment is heheheheheh. Nope.


End file.
